Tuesday, September 24, 2013

"The Power Of The Pacific"

The Pacific Ocean is four blocks from my house.I can see it right now, looking out my office
window in the upstairs of my house.It’s
blue, and, true to the Spanish version of its name – which is also its actual name – it is calm.

For claustrophobics like myself, Los Angeles’ open “Fourth
Wall” on its western boundary is an easeful relief, an elbow-rooming exhale, in
contrast to the suffocating confinement of the urban East.I can relax at the ocean.I have a ready escape route.

The ocean is also a reassuring “Force of Nature.”(I like to think of myself as a “Force of Nature” as well, but in a smaller
package.So I identify.)The ocean has been around and has seen it
all.On many past occasions, when inner
turmoil threatened to overwhelm me, I would take myself to the ocean, and be
soothed by its comforting eternality.My
problems are transitory, it reminds me without saying a word.The ocean is forever.

Surprisingly, I do not get down to the ocean that often.As I said, we live four blocks away.However, as the great writer Bruce Jay
Friedman once wrote, comparing a condo he occupied on Malibu beach, for some
reason if you’re not living directly on the
beach, you might as well be living in Nebraska.

It’s really close.But you don’t go.It feels like
it’s too hard.There’s a hill, there’s
lights, there’s traffic.But it may be
because it’s too easy.The ocean’s not going anywhere.What’s the rush?

I do go
sometimes.Yom Kippur, when I’m fasting,
after a “long-enough” visit to the synagogue, I buy a magazine or a newspaper,
I head for the beach, find a free bench facing the water, and I set myself
down, to rest and relax.And not go
home, where they’re cooking the “fast-breaking” dinner, and the insinuating
aromas threaten my resistance not to eat.

Sometime, I ask the ocean if it thinks I’ve been inscribed in
the “Book of Life” for another year, and the ocean – who knows – remains Mum.Reminding me in its silence that the matter is out of my control.Though I could
have stayed in synagogue a little longer.

I also, on occasion, go down to the concreted beachside path
to walk.I never wear headphones.I like to hear what’s going on.Also, when I’m crossing the bike path, lacking
great peripheral vision, I need the aural evidence of approaching peddlers to
keep this perambulating gentleman from being bicycled into the pavement.

Last Saturday, tiring of treadmilling to nowhere, as is my
habit as I listen to “Books- On-Tape, the most recent one being a biography of Calvin
Coolidge, I decided to face the challenge of the four-block obstacle and I headed
for the ocean.

And I’m walking along, singing a song.That’s not just a rhyming sentence.In lieu of an i-Pod, I sing to myself.I
am my own personal playlist.And I am
delighted with every selection.

The ocean on my right as I head south towards Venice
pier.Suddenly from behind, but
relatively closely behind, I hear a male voice speaking with military
insistence, shouting,

“WALKER!ON THE
RIGHT!”

This is followed by a series of repetitions echoing with
diminishing volume backwards into the distance.

“WALKER! ON THE RIGHT!”“Walker!On the right!” “Walker!On the
right!”“Walker!On the right!”

“Walker on the right.”What, I wondered could that mean?It sounded like some kind of a
warning.But what?Was there a person with a walker that needed
to be avoided?Was it “Walker: Texas
Ranger” and this was an unexpected ”Celebrity spotting”?What exactly was going on?And who was barking out those orders?

Then, as I turn my head, I see a squadron of maybe thirty
runners (who I subsequently learn are preparing for the “L.A. Marathon” eight
months away) passing me on my left, their leader alerting them, as he would do
later concerning water on the ground and a big dog on an extended leash.In this
case, the impediment he was alerting them to

was me.

I was the walker on the right.

To be honest, I did not enjoy being “Walker!On the right!”I felt somehow diminished, a total stranger
having taken the measure of my disciplined efforts to remain in shape and found
them pathetically insufficient.

Walker on the right.

Versus

Runners on the left.

“Hey!I’d walked all
the way down here, Pal!”

Only to hear

“Dawdler!On the
right!”

“Decrepit person!On
the right!”

“Person who thinks they’re exercising but come on who are we kidding?On the
right!”

This never happens when I’m on the treadmill.On the treadmill, I feel vindicated.I am getting my work in.I am exercising my heart.

1 comment:

Earl, I believe you once mentioned that your Wednesday walks are to a particular place - a coffee shop? - because you required a destination. You couldn't just go out for a walk and then come back. Did you ever consider making the ocean your destination, and walking along the path, before returning home?

I can't remember why you only walk on Wednesday, if you use a treadmill for your regular exercise. But I totally get the idea of not going to a beach unless you live right on it. I've spent weeks, and almost a year one time, living near what I believe to be the most beautiful beach in this country. I could see it from our home as well. Yet I only actually went there a tiny percentage of the time I could have.

Of course, I did once live right on that very same beach for a few months. And I still didn't spend a whole lot of time on it. I absolutely loved the view, though. My problem is that I hate sand and I hate being hot. But I will only go in the water when it's not too cold...which usually means it has to be really hot outside.

My ideal place to live, if money was no object, would be a house on a Caribbean island with a rocky shore. I would have a deck that extended right over the water, so that I could just step right into it. I don't mind the sand on the bottom of the ocean, just the stuff you have to walk through to get to the water.

Still, walking along the edge of the water, barefoot in the sand, just before sunset, when the temps have come down a bit and there might be a small breeze is one of my all time favorite things to do. I don't know why I've rarely done it, even when I've had ample opportunity to do so.